Authors

Discussion

This paper draws on a rare, privately held memoir, shared with the family’s permission, to explore Jewish identity, survival, and mobility from the outbreak of World War I to the author's decision to emigrate from Soviet Russia in 1924. The memoir offers a continuous, first-hand account of life in the Jewish Pale of Settlement during the late Tsarist period, tracing the author’s conscription in 1914, service in field hospitals on the Eastern Front, and experiences amid the revolutions of 1917, the Civil War, War Communism, and the early years of the New Economic Policy. By integrating personal narrative with contemporaneous records, the study examines how Jewish individuals navigated professional, religious, and social identities under the pressures of Tsarist conscription, state violence, and the political and ideological transformations of Lenin’s regime. The author’s reflections reveal the strategies of adaptation, endurance, and survival that shaped Jewish life across these turbulent decades, shedding light on the resilience and agency of Jewish communities in both late Tsarist and early Soviet Russia, and contributing to broader discussions on political survival and cultural continuity during times of revolutionary upheaval.